The Life, Work, and Legacy of Justice Holmes

In recent decades, Oliver Wendell Holmes has been praised as "the only great American legal thinker" and "the most illustrious figure in the history of American law." But in Albert Alschuler's critique of both Justice Holmes and contemporary legal scholarship, a darker portrait is painted—that of a man who, among other things, espoused Social Darwinism, favored eugenics, and, as he himself acknowledged, came "devilish near to believing that might makes right."

Acknowledgments1. Moral Skepticism in Twentieth-Century American Law2. A Power-Focused Philosophy3. Would You Have Wanted Justice Holmes as a Friend?4. The Battlefield Conversion of Oliver Wendell Holmes5. Holmes's Opinions6. Judging the Common Law7. The Descending Trail: Holmes's Path of the Law8. The Beatification of Oliver Wendell Holmes9. Ending the Slide from Socrates and Climbing BackNotesIndex

For more information, or to order this book, please visit http://www.press.uchicago.edu